Hike! Thank you, Great Wall Forum

[paonia]

Hello everybody!
Just back from 18 days of China including a 2-day-trip Jinshanling-Simatai and Gubeikou-Military section.
We did the walk accompanied by Snow who introduced himself in this forum.
We went as a small group, just family, seven people, parents in the fifties and grown-up kids in the twenties.
Snow did a good job, even brought a second guide because two of us were afraid of heights and not sure they would manage the Gubeikou section. The plan was that one guide would continue with the group while the other would turn around with the two if necessary. (We found out that it was not as difficult as we thought.)

We were very lucky as there were very little people on the Jinshanling section. Naturally we attracted the local “guides” who zoomed unto us from the first step and ran along us till their “colleagues” further on took over, including a 72-year-old toothless but very smiling guy. When it became clear to him that we wouldn’t buy he started to moan and sigh to show the hardship of his life, all the while happily chatting with the only Chinese speaking member of the family.
We had a not very Chinese lunch of sandwiches and fruit on one of the watchtowers and enjoyed the setting of our “restaurant”.
Arriving at Simatai, the younger and/or more courageous ones took the Flying Fox, the rest walked down.
We had a night in the – how to put it – very “authentic” Chinese hotel at the foot of the Simatai cablecar, where we enjoyed a very good banquet style dinner. It would have been nicer if the British group staying there with us would have been a bit more thoughtful. They were getting up at 4.00 in the morning to get their “sunrise on the wall”- experience. That is ok, guys. But next time no full blast roll call for 20 persons at this hour, please.

We got up somewhat later and drove to Gubeikou. We had decided earlier to walk to the military section only and then descend to a village where the driver would wait for us.
On this day, we were the only beings on the wall! We walked this stretch and had the wall all alone for us. At the last tower before the military section we had our lunch.
We sat on this tower for over one hour, basking in the September sun and meditating the Wall running along the hills and mountains.
This is a picture I will always have in my mind.

Thanks to everybody in the forum whose article or response contributed to our decision making. Really, thanks a lot!

[Bryan]

Thank you, paonia, for your report. I am glad your visit went well. Please post some photos if you get a chance in the future.

Thanks also to Snow for helping!

[paonia]

Ähem, we took around 5000 photos
That will take some time to choose from.
But I'll do, I promise!
Paonia